a voice from way outside the norm
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I would love to be able to report that this clown, fool, douchebag, Christian minister was an example of Poe’s Law, but sadly, he appears to be genuine.
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BBC Urdu reports — according to a Google Translation — that Pakistan’s Deputy Attorney General has launched a criminal investigation against Zuckerberg and others in response to Facebook hosting a “Draw Muhammad” contest on its site late last month. On May 19, Pakistani authorities blocked access to Facebook over the contest, and this ban was lifted on May 31 after Facebook removed the page in Pakistan and other countries.
Last month, according to English-language Pakistani newspaper The News International, a Pakistani High Court judge summoned the police after lawyer Muhammad Azhar Siddique filed an application for a First Information Report (FIR), claiming that the owners of Facebook had committed a heinous and serious crime under Section 295-C of the Pakistan Penal Code. In essence, an FIR launches a criminal investigation. But no charges have been filed.
According to the paper, Section 295-C of the penal code reads: “Use of derogatory remark etc, in respect of the Holy Prophet, whoever by words, either spoken or written, or by visible representation, or by any imputation, innuendo, or insinuation, directly or indirectly, defiles the sacred name of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (Peace Be Upon Him) shall be punished with death, or imprisonment for life, and shall also be liable for fine.”
According to two reports — one at Boxcrack.net, a kind of citizen journalism site run by Privacy International, and another at Pro Pakistani, a Pakistani Telecom and IT news site that lifted the news from BBC Urdu — the Deputy Attorney General has indeed lodged an FIR against Zuckerberg, fellow co-founders Dustin Moskovitz and Chris Hughes, and “Andy”, the German woman who initiated the Draw Muhammad contest under a pseudonym.
According to Pro Paskistani, petitioner Muhammad Azhar Sidiqque said he’s waiting for the police to contact Interpol about making arrangements for the arrest of Facebook’s owners and “Andy”. The site also says that the Deputy Attorney General told the High Court that Pakistan’s United Nations representative has asked to escalate the issue in the UN General Assembly. (theregister.com)
Do these Pakistani fools have nothing better to do? Couldn’t their time be better spent trying to drag themselves out of the 3rd century into the 21st the rest of the world is experiencing?
Yes, the Draw Muhammad contest was blasphemous; it was meant to be. It was intended to expose the superstitious nonsense that passes for religion. This response simply reinforces the fact that Islam as practiced by far too many Muslims is anything but a religion of peace. It’s more like a petulant 4-year-old who doesn’t get his way and throws tantrums at every opportunity.
Get a clue, folks. The non-Muslim world doesn’t give a flying fuck about your prophet or your beliefs, just like the non-Christian world doesn’t give a flying fuck about their silly beliefs. If your beliefs work for you, great, be as illogical and unrealistic as you want. But don’t fool yourselves into thinking those outside your club care to live by your rules. The more you try to force your unwanted beliefs on us, the harder we’ll fight back and stand up to your attempted enslavement of our freedom to think as we wish.
That’s a complaint atheists encounter on a regular basis; atheists demean believers and misrepresent their beliefs in an effort to belittle them.
Do theists ever listen to themselves or read what they write?
Fox News on-line has a reasonably “fair and balanced” article on the different viewpoints on religion held by Christpher Hitchens and his brother Peter. Perhaps conveniently Christopher couldn’t be reached for comment, but even though the article is focused primarily on Peter’s comments it still manages not to completely vilify Christopher.
Like many on-line news outlets, even blogs, the comments reveal more than the article does.
Right off the bat the accusations fly,
theists are free to not believe in God if they don’t want to. Wnat bothers me is (1) Arrogance of some atheists and their disdain for those who believe, and (2) Some atheists’ suppression of fair debate and expression of thought
Obviously the religious never engage in disdain for those who don’t agree with them and are never arrogant. Right. Let’s read further,
“To those who call themselves “atheists”: There is no God? Really? And you know this HOW? You have been EVERYWHERE and know EVERYTHING in all dimensions and in all galaxies, and there is no God?”
There are several documented cases of people experiencing discrimination simply by offering an opinion other than Big Bang and Evolution. There is no one stupid except for the one unwilling to learn.
“Evolution is a proven fact.” You’ve just proven how little you know about your cherished theory.
One simple question to those “atheist” out there. Where did life come from? Hmm? And don’t say macro evolution. Evolution is a disproven THEORY. A rational “atheist” would be more accurate in calling themselves an agnostic.
God is the Spirit of Truth says the Holy Bible. Fear of God is the beginning of knowledge (Proverbs) but a fool says in his heart, there is no God (Psalm 14). Science is the study of nature, which reveals the handiwork of God. God is not a respector of nations or individuals. A nation that does not respect God shall not prosper.
Believing that there isn’t a God is also a belief. It must be an unfounded belief because it can’t be proven any more than one can prove there is a God. And many prefer to believe that love and intelligence and creativity flows through us and comes from an eternal God.
Being atheistic is largely an ego thing..A longing to be different..A cry for attention..”Look at me..I’m an atheist..” So, big deal….. Being an old US Army veteran I can attest to the fact there are no atheists in foxholes…
I’m not going to make the ridiculous claim, as some theists might about their fellow believers, that non-believers are always polite and respectful of the opinions of others. Obviously there are some very angry atheists out there who are tired of being condemned to hell and called fools for their lack of faith. Perhaps they have had enough of the unreasonable presumption that only those who believe in gods are true patriots or qualified to hold public office. Maybe they’ve had enough of hearing the religious say that non-believers desire only to live in sin and not be accountable to one god or another. There might even be more than a few really angry non-believers living under theocratic governments who are resentful of knowing at any moment they could be arrested and executed without a fair trial simply for not agreeing with the ruling majority.
I’m sure many people living under constant persecution and threats of death come across less than genial when speaking out against their oppressors. I don’t doubt that there are those who, while not living under such intolerable conditions, empathize so much with those who do that their own opinions are less than polite. That the religious are blind to those conditions is not surprising, nor is it excusable.
Most of the atheists I know don’t consider believers to be stupid in the totality of their thinking; it’s only on the topic of gods that many intelligent people abandon their otherwise healthy skepticism and doubt and embrace the fantastic without question. It’s not that stupid people are religious, it’s that religion makes you stupid about belief.
And if that sort of comment offends you, tough shit. Get the mote out of your own eye before you attempt to bitch about my vision. (BTW-I, too, am an Army veteran, and let me tell you, there are indeed atheists in foxholes. I was one.)
A student has been suspended from school in America for coming to class dressed as a pirate.
But the disciplinary action has provoked controversy – because the student says that the ban violates his rights, as the pirate costume is part of his religion.
Bryan Killian says that he follows the Pastafarian religion, and that as a crucial part of his faith, he must wear ‘full pirate regalia’ as prescribed in the holy texts of Pastafarianism.
The school, however, say that his pirate garb was disruptive.
Pastafarianism gained wide attention when its key prophet, Bobby Henderson, wrote to the Kansas School Board during the height of the controversy over ‘Intelligent Design‘ being taught in science classes. His letter, also published on his website, demanded equal time be given to the teachings of the Flying Spaghetti Monster as was given to ID and evolutionary theory.
Since then, the Flying Spaghetti Monster has gained countless followers worldwide, although there are those who remain spagnostic.
The school, in North Buncombe, North Carolina, remains adamant that their decision to suspend Killian for a day has nothing to do with his religion, and quite a lot to do with his repeated refusal to heed warnings against wearing pirate outfits. (Source-Sunday Metro)
Pirates, unite! We must stand by our fellow Pastafarians when they are oppressed. AAAARRrrrrggggg.
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No doubt these religious nutz will soon be crying persecution, their favorite mantra. But how many gay-friendly booths have you ever seen at religious celebrations, if you’ve ever attended one? I won’t even address in depth the presumption of trying to infiltrate the Pride Parade knowing full well they hadn’t paid for the privilege of doing so. Let this be a warning to all LGBT-haters, find your own venues to spew your nonsense, leave ours alone.
The Minneapolis Gay Pride Fest is the third largest GLBTQFA festival in the country. Of which we are very proud. Which is why we call it the pride festival.
Well, yesterday, three people form Hayward Wisconsin, which seems to be in a region that is a hotbed of bible thumping yahooism, were arrested.
Previously, these three people (father, wife, son, traditional family and all that) had a booth at the fest but this year were not issued a permit. The difference between previous years and this year is how much of the park fees were paid by the pride fest organizers. This year, for the first time, the festival organizers paid the full fee instead of getting support form the part, and therefore, had the legal right to determine exactly who would be issued rights to set up a vending booth and who would not be issued a permit.
The bible thumping yahoos are all about curing teh gayz, and rescuing them from the sin of homosexuality and stuff. The equivalent would be having a holocaust denial booth at a celebration of the founding of Israel, or a creationist booth at a science education convention.
(Source-scienceblogs)
I can’t recall a larger social issue for the gay community since Stonewall than that of the fight to legalize gay marriage across the country. A good look at this blog will tell you I’m in favor of legalizing gay marriage. This post is not an argument for giving up that effort. It’s a reality check for my brothers and sisters.
Lately the tone of discourse on the topic of same-sex marriage has caused me to wonder if gays are hoping that when we win the right to marry we will also enjoy an increase in acceptance and general social equality. I hope not, because I think just the opposite might occur.
We are already seeing an increase, ending soon I hope, of extremely violent and anti-social crimes being committed in the name of one god or another. When those on the far religious right feel that their power is being taken away, that their passionate beliefs are being challenged and even being marginalized, when they begin to realize that they are losing their choke-hold on the population they panic. In their panic they are lashing out in sometimes violent ways.
Religious extremism has killed a security guard, a doctor, Olympic athletes and over three thousand workers in two high-rise office buildings in New York. Religious extremists would like to turn this country into a theistic state so every time an American soldier has to kill an armed and dangerous enemy soldier, it can instead be portrayed as a war between Christians and Muslims. And hasn’t that played well throughout history. Religious extremists want to tell you what to think. The rest of us are begging you to think for yourselves.
The more that gays are out there, the more attention is called to the gay community, the more these wing-nuts will see us as a worthy target of their frustration and anger. How long before we hear about crosses being burned on the lawns of gay couples? Bigotry is not always a silent, festering sickness. Bigots can be like pimples, both pop if squeezed hard enough. The output of both is pretty disgusting.
I don’t mean to rain on the progress being made by gay people across the nation. I just want to send a warning message: Don’t mistake the courts granting marriage rights in some states as a sign that society is becoming more accepting of everyone who identifies as LGBT. Paul Lynde was accepted by my peers though it was clear he was a complete queen. Openly gay people have enjoyed acceptance in small numbers, better if they’re artists and entertainers. But there remains a general reluctance to accept gays in every day life. The Average Joe doesn’t want us in his church or on his bowling team. On his TV set, OK. Living next door with his husband? Not so OK, even though they’d be the first people he asked to watch the family cat while they go on vacation.
Let’s get the right to marry in all 50 states. That’s a worthwhile and acheiveable goal. But it won’t be the end of the road by any means. Gays have been demonized by the religious right (an attitude that has managed to infect even the generally liberal) so well and for so long that it will take several more generations before being LGBT is of minor interest to the general population. Unbelieveably, there are still racists, and how much longer have Blacks enjoyed acceptance by that same Average Joe?
We still have a long row to hoe. We shouldn’t let a bad case of social acne slow us down or defeat us.
Seattle Gay Bars Receive Threatening Letters
Eleven gay bars in Seattle received letters today addressed to the “Owner/Manager” from someone claiming to be in the possession of ricin, a deadly poison. “Your establishment has been targeted,” the letter begins. “I have in my possession approximately 67 grams of ricin with which I will indiscriminately target at least five of your clients.”
“I felt sick when I read it,” said Carla, the owner/manager of Re-bar. “It’s so vile. It’s just hatred. It made me worry for all the other bars, and for my bartenders, and our clientele.”
According to the CDC’s website, someone who has ingested “a significant amount” will develop vomiting and diarrhea within the first 6-12 hours; other symptoms of ricin poisoning include hallucinations, seizures, and blood in the urine. There is no antidote for ricin but ricin exposure is not invariably fatal.
“I just had the police come pick [the letter] up,” said Keith Christensen, the manager of the Eagle, when reached by phone. Christensen had already heard about the letter from other bar owners and managers, and so he didn’t open it. “It’s probably nothing,” Christensen added, “but the economy is really screwing all the bars right now, and the last thing we need is something ramping up the not-go-out mode people seem to be in right now. It’s really freaky that someone would do something like this at a time like this.”
“The police have already come and gone,” said Roland, the manager at Madison Pub. “They collected the letter and that’s about it. I don’t think it’s anything to worry about it.” Roland admitted to being unnerved by the letter at first.
“But after the initial ‘what?’, it’s like whatever.”
A letter also arrived in The Stranger’s offices, addressed to the attention of “Obituaries.” The letter’s author said the paper should “be prepared to announce the deaths of approximately 55 individuals all of whom were patrons of the following establishments on a Saturday in January.” The listed bars are: the Elite, Neighbours, Wild Rose, the Cuff, Purr, the Eagle, R Place, Re-bar, CC’s, Madison Pub, and the Crescent. “I could take this moment to launch into a diatribe about my indignation towards the gay community,” the letter concludes, “however, I think the deaths will speak for themselves.”
Alison, Luying, and Tippett, local promoters and DJs who do nights at various bars around town, came up with the idea of organizing a pub crawl for this Friday night to show support for the bars that were threatened. (Source-the stranger)
Party on, my brothers and sisters. The best revenge is to show this cretian how pathetic his attempt at domestic terrorism really is.
Sponsors of the California ballot measure that banned same-sex marriage are seeking to nullify thousands of marriages between gay and lesbian couples performed after the state Supreme Court ruled them constitutional.
Rick Jacobs, founder and chair of the anti-Proposition 8 Courage Campaign, said he was “appalled” that the initiative’s supporters wanted to nullify the same-sex marriages that are already on the books.
“The motivation behind this mean-spirited and heart-breaking action should not be allowed to be buried in legal brief,” he said. “If Proposition 8’s sponsors plan to destroy lives, they should at least have the courage to admit it publicly.”
Opponents argue that the amendment cannot be applied retroactively, but proponents say the amendment is clear on that issue.
“Proposition 8’s brevity is matched by its clarity,” one of the briefs read. “There are no conditional clauses, exceptions, exemptions, or exclusions: ‘Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California.’
” … Its plain language encompasses both pre-existing and later-created same-sex (and polygamous) marriages, whether performed in California or elsewhere. With crystal clarity, it declares that they are not valid or recognized in California.” (Source-CNN)
This comes as no surprise to those of us who have been warning of the effort to impose theocratic rule in the U.S. If the proponents of Prop. 8 were only concerned with preserving their “traditional” concept of marriage they wouldn’t be continuing to push their agenda. They won, for now. But their goal has never been limited to preserving the meaning of marriage. They will not rest until a solid precident has been established that allows theocratic belief to be the basis for state, and eventually federal, law. They want to create a loophole in the separation clause. Their ultimate and obvious goal is to establish a theocracy, a United States under God. Their god.
This is going beyond the desire to preserve an institution. That can be done without the need for retroactive nullifications. This latest effort even goes beyond mean-spirited. It’s nothing less than an attack on our form of government by theistic subversives, a form of fundamentalist terrorism not much different in motivation than those who fly planes into American buildings.
…this week the Vatican’s permanent observer to the United Nations, said the Holy See would oppose a resolution that would protect gays from being killed just because they are gay, because it would “add new categories of those protected from discrimination” and could lead to reverse discrimination against traditional heterosexual marriage.
The French resolution, scheduled to be proposed this week, recommends protecting Gays and Lesbians from being jailed or killed because of their sexual orientation and is being introduced to the UN on behalf of the European Union.
But Archbishop Celestino Migliore said, if adopted, the resolution would create “new and implacable discriminations,” and also said that states which do not recognize same-sex unions as ‘matrimony’ will be pilloried and made an objects of pressure.
However, the French resolution, which is supported by all 27 members of the European Union, says absolutely nothing about gay marriage; it is about ending jail and death penalty sentences gays yet face in more than 85 countries including Afghanistan, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Yemen where you can still be killed for being gay.
An editorial in Italy’s mainstream La Stampa newspaper said the Vatican’s reasoning was “grotesque.” Another editorial in Rome’s La Repubblica newspaper said the Vatican’s position “leaves one dumbstruck.”
Gay rights activist’s in Italy and in other European Union countries fear that the Vatican is calling for another “Holy Alliance” between the Vatican and Islamic states in the United Nations to oppose the proposed resolution, just as they did in 1994, when the Vatican teamed up with Islamic and Latin American countries to defeat an abortion rights proposal.
They have also said that the Vatican’s reasoning smacked of “total idiocy and madness” and what the Vatican really feared was a “chain reaction in favor of legally recognized homosexual unions in countries, like Italy, where there is currently no legislation.”
A Vatican spokesman said yesterday “no-one wants the death penalty or jail or fines for homosexuals”, he however did defend Archbishop Migliore’s comments, adding that the Vatican was in the majority on the issue, pointing out that 50 member states of the United Nations have adhered to the proposal in question while more than 150 have not. (lezgetreal.com)
This would be simply sad if the result of this decision didn’t result in the killing of gay men and women in over 85 countries around the world simply for being gay.
Once upon a time the church was seen as a refuge for the world’s oppressed and downtrodden. It was the champion of the weak, the meek and the disadvantaged. It told us the meek would inherit the Earth. It implored us to treat others as we would want to be treated. The church offered hope to those without hope, love to the unloved, peace to all.
Now the Catholic church has exposed its true nature. It’s nothing more than a repressive government, much like those it supports in the 3rd world.
The killing of gays for being gay is on par with the killing of Jews for being Jewish, which was once done by another government the Catholic church was comfortable allowing to practice genocide. To be sure, they don’t actually kill the gays themselves. They can pretend their hands are without stain. But they will be judged by the rest of humanity by their actions, their spineless refusal to actually practice what they preach.
Not accepting gays in the fold is one thing; to stand by without objection while they are being killed is unconscionable.
In the 1950s there were the angry young men.
Angry Young Men is a journalistic catchphrase applied to a number of British playwrights and novelists from the mid-1950s. The phrase was originally used by British newspapers after the success of the play Look Back in Anger to describe young British writers, though it was derived from the autobiography of Leslie Paul, founder of the Woodcraft Folk, whose “Angry Young Man” was published in 1951.
It has been used more generically, to refer to a young person who strongly criticizes political and social institutions.(Wikipedia)
In the 60s we had the Students for a Democratic Society, the Black Panthers, the Yippies and the Weathermen. There were a lot of angry young men, and women. Angry at the Nixon White House, angry about the war in Vietnam, angry about the apparent decline of Western society. I was one of them, a campus leftist radical who sometimes felt the only way change would ever come about was to (figuratively) burn the whole rotten edifice to the ground and rebuild it in the spirit of the founding fathers.
Where are the angry young men today?
In the 40 years since I’ve become quite disillusioned and have found my radicalism to largely be a wasted effort. Obviously America was not ready to change its ways. We needed war to stimulate the economy and keep the military/industrial complex rich and powerful. We didn’t seem to be able to elect a decent president. Americans eschewed the voting booth in favor of daytime soap operas. Americans had become placated, mindless, unquestioning sheep, afraid to challenge the government and unwilling to risk their comfortable lifestyles.
The only favor done to this country by Bush and the fundamental religious-right has been to reignite the radicalism many of us have been repressing for four decades. After eight years of what I can only characterize as the worst presidency of the 20th century people are beginning to wake up to the failure of the American dream.
Ordinary Americans have lost their jobs, their homes and their hope. Their children may not be attending college. They can longer afford to retire. All they’ve worked for, all their goals, have been reduced to ash by greedy shysters and corrupt businessmen. They watch their tax dollars being used to bail out inefficient companies led by unscrupulous charlatans while their small businesses fail and their taxes rise. Americans are becoming mad as hell, and well they should be. They’ve only now woken up to the fact that they’ve been played as suckers. They’ve been stuck with the bill for a party they didn’t even attend.
These conditions incite radicalism. When people have been beaten down as far as they can be, they finally begin to resist, to ask the questions they should have been asking 40 years ago. They start to oppose “business as usual”, they refuse to accept the life handed to them by those who posses the wealth and the power, the same people responsible for their plight. When the shit hits the fan, and there’s no end of shit in sight, at least turn off the fan. People are beginning to demand that we turn off the fan. Then we can start to reduce the pile of shit.
A common radical expression was “Power to the People”. Folks dismissed the idea as too radical for the 60s. Maybe they’ve finally come to understand what we were saying and to agree with those sentiments. We need to reclaim our power as citizens. We need to be reminded that we are the government, we own the government, they work for us. We are the United States of America. We say where the country is headed, we determine the priorities. We expect demand that our representatives actually represent our needs. We didn’t hire them to do what they want but what we want. The Supreme Court’s there to make sure we don’t want something contrary to the Constitution and that’s a good thing. If we subvert the Constitution we deserve to lose our country.
So to all you wealthy preachers preying on those who trust you, to all you bankers and mortgage investors who lent money in bad faith to those most desperately trying to live the dream, to all you auto company executives too stupid to drive the cars you manufacture to a meeting where you beg for our money so you can keep doing the crappy job you’ve been doing while getting filthy rich, instead choosing to fly in your private jets as a further slap in the face of your customers and investors; FUCK YOU.
We need to become radical again. We need radical ideas, radical approaches to the problems we face. We need to face the fact that we cannot go back. The old ways no longer work. The rest of the world has changed. We must adapt or we will perish.
My philosophical hero, Henry Rollins, America Under Attack:
